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Senate Passes Measure To Cut Funding To Public Radio & Broadcasting; Trump Tries To Shift Blame To Democrats As GOP Splits Over Epstein; Trump Tells Fictional Story About Uncle And Unabomber. Aired 12:30-1p ET
Aired July 17, 2025 - 12:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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[12:33:44]
DANA BASH, CNN ANCHOR: While most of you were sound asleep at 2:00 a.m. Eastern Standard Time, Senate Republicans were busy trying to kick Big Bird out of the nest. Senators voted to cut funding Congress already allocated, including for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which funds TV and radio stations across the country. It is a win for President Trump who has claimed NPR and PBS are biased and left-leaning.
And way before Donald Trump, Republicans have been trying to defund public broadcasting for more than 50 years. Even Mr. Rogers testified before Congress back in 1969.
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FRED ROGERS, CHILDREN'S TV HOST: What do you do with the mad that you feel when you feel so mad you could bite? When the whole wide world seems oh so wrong, and nothing you do seems very right.
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BASH: CNN Chief Media Analyst Brian Stelter joins me now. Brian, OK, that was before both of our times, but we do know that that worked. And the lawmaker said, Mr. Rogers, Fred Rogers, you can keep your funding. That's not happening now.
BRIAN STELTER, CNN CHIEF MEDIA ANALYST: No, this is the end of a publicly funded media era. This dates back to the days of black and white television.
[12:35:04]
You know, back in the 60s, Congress saw a value for PBS and NPR, but no more. As a result of this rescission, radio and TV stations will have to lay off staffers and cut back on programming. Some smaller stations will suffer more than bigger stations, right? Popular shows like "Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood" and "Sesame Street" aren't going to go away, but they may reach fewer people.
These big city stations in metro areas are going to have to rely more on viewer donations. Smaller stations may go off the air entirely. In fact, we've heard in the past few minutes from the head of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, who says, quote, "many of those stations will suffer and go off the air."
And here's what PBS CEO Paula Kerger said this morning. She said, quote, "These cuts will significantly impact all of our stations, but will be especially devastating to smaller stations and those serving large rural areas." So Big Bird's not going away, but the financial system that supported him for decades is going away.
And over time, what happens is the system becomes weaker. Without federal support, new shows won't be developed, new local programming won't happen, and there will be fewer local reporters in neighborhoods actually covering news. So that's the impact over time. It's not going to happen right away, Dana, but over months and years, there will be a trickle-down effect because this money is drying up.
BASH: And Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski, Brian, was one of the two Republicans who voted no. And she put on social media about what she called a tsunami warning issued in Alaska. It was a tsunami warning issued in Alaska, and it reached people through local public broadcasting. Here's what she said.
"Some colleagues --
STELTER: Right.
BASH: -- claim they are targeting radical leftist organizations with these cuts, but in Alaska, these are simply organizations dedicated to communities. Their response in today's earthquake is a perfect example of the incredible public service these stations provide." She went on to say, "They deliver local news, weather updates, and, yes, emergency alerts that save human lives."
As you kind of alluded to, supporters of the funding cuts say that in the era of streaming, public stations aren't needed for things even like what Murkowski is talking about. Who has the right point here?
STELTER: They do have a point to some degree. Look, the media world has changed radically since public broadcasting was created in the 60s. Back then, there was a bipartisan consensus that noncommercial TV and radio was a good thing, that kids' shows should exist without ads.
Think about "Reading Rainbow" and "Sesame Street" and "Mr. Rogers." Congress defended this idea even when past Republican presidents tried to decrease the budget for PBS and NPR. Lawmakers said they liked the local programming back home.
So what changed? Well, like so much of our political discourse, it became nationalized and polarized. Like you said, you know, conservative activists have been agitating for this outcome for 50 years. They've always wanted this money to be stripped away. But there was this support for localization of media that has now gone to the wayside because of arguments about national bias.
Look at David Bozell today. He's the head of the Media Research Center, which has advocated for this cut to happen for decades. He says, "PBS and NPR were chartered to provide objective journalism. Instead, we got drag shows for kids, gushing coverage of Democrats, and silence or smears for conservatives."
So Republicans condemned perceived bias at the national level. Democrats decry local harms at the local level. They're talking past each other. And the ultimate outcome is here. The money's going away, and we're going to find out what the results are.
BASH: Yes, it's -- we certainly are. And whether or not private donations are going to sustain these public broadcasting agencies or areas outside of the big cities is the question that you pose. And it's -- we're going to be following it. I know you are for sure, Brian.
Thank you so much. Appreciate you giving us that reporting.
And up next on Inside Politics, why is it so hard for President Trump to bat down Jeffrey Epstein conspiracy theories? Donie O'Sullivan will be here. He has his finger on the pulse of all kinds of movements, especially those that have conspiracies that fuel them. He'll be here next.
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[12:43:47]
BASH: President Trump is no stranger to facing questions about conspiracy theories. Here he is in 2020 when asked about those who believed in QAnon.
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DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I don't know much about the movement other than I understand they like me very much, which I appreciate. But I don't know much about the movement. I have heard that it is gaining in popularity. I've heard these are people that love our country.
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BASH: You know who does know a lot about QAnon and so many other conspiracy theories? You're looking at him, Donie O'Sullivan. Thank you so much. You have covered the intersection of the Internet, of conspiracy theories, living on and feeding off the Internet and politics for a long time.
So, you are the person that I wanted to talk to to help explain what we are seeing right now with Jeffrey Epstein and whether or not President Trump is going to be able to persuade the people who have followed him for so long, who are also purveyors of and believers in these conspiracy theories about Epstein, whether he will convince them to drop it.
[12:45:01] DONIE O'SULLIVAN, CNN SENIOR CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Dana, I mean, I think what's so interesting about the clip you just played there of Trump back in 2020, right, is that like his sort of flirtation there with QAnon. I mean, Jeffrey Epstein and conspiracy theories about Jeffrey Epstein is one of the most inherent parts of QAnon.
BASH: Exactly (ph).
O'SULLIVAN: We also saw some research from the liberal watchdog group Media Matters that said Trump has reposted from QAnon promoting accounts on Truth Social. He's reposted those sort of accounts more than 1,000 times as of just earlier this year. So I think what is really confusing for so many people in that sort of hardcore MAGA base, the sort of more QAnon edges of it, is that like, he has been -- they believe that he was endorsing QAnon and therefore endorsing all the Epstein stuff for years now.
So I think, you know, there's nothing more -- there's no basically bigger a conspiracy theory or something that has such staying power within the MAGAverse, within QAnon, than Epstein and then the 2020 election lie, the idea that the election was stolen. So I think Trump coming out and -- like we could never imagine Trump coming out and saying, you know what, the 2020 election wasn't stolen. I was wrong about that, that was a hoax. That's why this is so shocking.
And we spoke to some people at Turning Point USA, more general Trump supporters, not necessarily QAnon folks, at the weekend, and here's what they had to say.
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LISA BRITT, TRUMP SUPPORTER: I don't think people are going to be quiet about it until they really do it. But who knows if we'll ever know the true story.
TAYLOR SHARP, TRUMP SUPPORTER: Well I think that if they don't release the Epstein files, whatever JD Vance says then is irrelevant because it's like everybody's going to take it as like a lie because of what Donald Trump did. But I think JD Vance wants these files released as well.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And this is the first topic that all of us as Americans, not as Democrats, not as Liberals, not as Republicans, are actually lining together and saying we all want the Epstein files.
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BASH: And Donie, we all remember how Donald Trump really made a splash in the political world before he ran, and that was pushing the conspiracy theory, which is no truth to it, that Barack Obama was not born in the U.S.
O'SULLIVAN: Yes.
BASH: So he knows how to do it in a way that works. We are watching him real-time inject another conspiracy theory in on top of all of this to try to save him, which is the Biden administration doctored the files. Could that actually have some legs in and among the people who you were just talking to there?
O'SULLIVAN: I will say from -- and I spoke to one person who's very, very down the QAnon rabbit hole. They're kind of buying into that, but that is people who are really down the rabbit hole. I think the folks that you saw in that video there who are more just basically normal Trump supporters, you know, they have an interest in the Epstein files because of what leadership and people like Trump have been saying for years, but they're not necessarily QAnon.
I don't know if they're going to buy this. Maybe we'll see over time. I will say everybody that we spoke to at that conference, none of them had any suspicion saying that Trump had anything to hide. But his behavior this week is making some people in the movement question that, to say, is he covering for somebody? Does he know something in these files that he doesn't want coming out? So, we'll just have to wait and see.
BASH: So fascinating.
Donie, thank you so much for being here and helping us understand it a bit more. Appreciate it.
And coming up, crying uncle, a bizarre, apparently fictional story about the president's uncle and a terrorist.
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BASH: Now to one of the more bizarre fictional stories the president has told about his MIT professor uncle and the Unabomber, Ted Kaczynski.
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TRUMP: My uncle was at MIT, one of the great professors. Kaczynski was one of his students. Do you know who Kaczynski was? There's very little difference between a madman and a genius. But Kaczynski, "I said, 'What kind of a student was he, Uncle John?' Dr. John Trump. He said, 'What kind of a student?' And then he said, 'Seriously, good.' He said, 'He'd correct -- he'd go around correcting everybody.' But it didn't work out too well for him."
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BASH: Now, Kaczynski, of course, killed three people during a multi- decade mail bomb spree. But as our fact checker Daniel Dale points out, what President Trump said cannot be true for two pretty big reasons. First, the timeline. The Unabomber's first attack was in 1978. But at that point, his identity was unknown.
Donald Trump's Uncle John died in 1985. Ted Kaczynski, and that name wasn't revealed, he wasn't known to be the Unabomber until more than a decade later when he was arrested in 1996. Then there's the other small problem. There's no record of Kaczynski ever attending the university where Professor Trump taught. Kaczynski majored in math at Harvard. He also attended the University of Michigan, while John Trump taught electrical engineering at MIT.
My panel is back. David?
DAVID CHALIAN, CNN POLITICAL DIRECTOR: You know that expression that we say in the newsroom sometimes, like, too good to fact check? The story is so good, you don't even want to actually fact check it to go with it? Well, this clearly was a too-good-to-be-true story, because you could see the enjoyment in the president's face for, like, spinning the yarn, but, like -- it's not even, like, I mean, nothing matches up to it. So it's unclear how this got into the --
BASH: Yes.
CHALIAN: -- being of his storytelling.
[12:55:08]
BASH: Luckily, this was not too good to fact check, because Daniel Dale --
CHALIAN: Yes, thankfully.
BASH: -- did just that.
ZOLAN KANNO-YOUNGS, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: That's right. And look, there are exaggerated details, false details, and presidents have done it in the past. This just seemed to be completely made up here. It just does not match at all the facts of history.
I mean, again, presidents have done this in the past. President Biden raised eyebrows when he said that his uncle was eaten by cannibals, which prompted a response from the government to Papua New Guinea, and that did not match at all the Defense Department accounting of that tragic death. But -- so, yes, false details have happened before. This just doesn't add up.
SABRINA RODRIGUEZ, NATIONAL POLITICS REPORTER, THE WASHINGTON POST: No, I mean, it's bizarre, but this sort of feels like that family uncle that you have that always tells, like, the wild stories, and you're like, is Bob serious, or is it a joke, or is it -- however, of course, this is the president of the United States. But I think this definitely falls in, like, the really bizarre ones for us.
BASH: Yes, and that says a lot.
Thank you all. Appreciate it.
Thank you for joining Inside Politics today. CNN News Central starts after the break.
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